Feigned InSanity
by anundecidedteen
Summary: Nobody is perfect, and so you let yourself pretend, and all the while she tries to hide how imperfect you both really are. Sequel to "Out of Sanity".


**Okay, sequel to "Out of Sanity" hope you all like it, and please let me know what you think, cause I'm not sure if this was the right path to take with this one.**

* * *

The television could be heard in_ every_ _single_ room, though no one was watching it. His attention was drawn to the improvised sounds of an epic battle that were going on behind the door, enhanced by the clamor of pots and pans, and of course the shrill cry of a very displeased child. He sighed before sliding the rice screen that separated him and the war zone open.

"Daddy!" A jubilant child of about five and a half stopped fighting the invisible enemy ninja to run over to the dark-haired man. Sasuke bent slightly to swing the boy up into his arms and onto his hip. "I'm playing ninja just like you!" He stared into the large obsidian eyes that copied his own. "Oh really? Are you beating them?" The little boy Scoffed and crossed his arms over his chest. "Of course I'm beating them. I'm an Uchiha after all." Sasuke's brow tilted in question. "Who told you that?" The boy's face turned from smug to confused at the tone of his father's voice. "Mommy told me that Uchihas are never beat because they are the best, and I'm an Uchiha, right daddy?"

Sasuke's eyes shifted to the woman standing before the stove, her shoulders were tense after the child's explanation. He turned back to the boy. "Why don't you go turn off the television since you're not watching it while I talk with your mother." The boy nodded, sensing the change in his father's demeanor, and wordlessly left the room.

Sasuke turned to the other child in the highchair, who was reaching his chubby hands as far as he could out to him. The elite shinobi shuffled over to his second son and released him from his prison. Snuggling him close as the child buried his head into his neck with a coo.

Sasuke then changed his direction to the woman chopping vegetables for dinner. He rubbed the silky black hair of the content toddler as he watched her precise actions for a moment. "You've been filling his head again." The woman did not lift her eyes from her task. "I haven't been filling his head with anything but the truth. As an Uchiha he is superior." Her haughty manner had his eyes narrowing.

"We've talked about this, and I thought I made myself clear when I told you to not speak of the past to him. Terrible things have happened because of that mentality, and I will not allow it to happen again because you don't know how to keep your mouth shut." Sasuke made sure to keep his voice low so the little peeping tom would not hear him reprimand his mother.

The woman dropped the knife on the cutting board and whirled around on him, her long hair flowing out beautifully behind her. "What do you want me to say when he asks why he doesn't have uncles or cousins, Sasuke?" She was oblivious of their child watching the scene. She spread her arms wide. "You want me to just ignore him? Tell him the truth about how his-"

He cut her off the only way he could without worrying the boy. He pulled her into a kiss she immediately responded to. He shut his eyes tighter as she deepened it and moaned wantonly regardless of the two child audience. "I'm done Daddy!" He pulled back as soon as the boy burst into the room. His wife pouted as she turned towards the boy. "Raiden! What have we told you about interrupting mommy and daddy time?" She placed her hands on her hips as the boy looked down at the floor. "That I'm not supposed to 'cause I get mommy time and daddy time, and so mommy and daddy should get their time."

Sasuke rolled his eyes at his wife's temper tantrum. A similar scene from his childhood replayed in his mind.

"_Sasuke, Itachi needs to work on his homework, he can play with you later." The young boy looked down with dejection. _

"_Don't worry, I can play with him. The academy stuff is easy anyways." Sasuke's head snapped up with an excited smile._

"It's fine, mommy and daddy can have their time later." Both of them looked over with excitement, and he had to hide his scowl.

"Oh Shoji has fallen asleep. I'll put him in his crib." Sasuke carefully handed the baby over to his mother and looked down at Raiden as he did a couple of kicks around the room. "Oh Sasuke-kun?" He looked up at the sound of his name and grunted for her to continue. "Can you go get us some milk? We're out and I need it for later." He nodded.

"Ah." She flashed him a bright smile. "Okay good, I'll see you later." He resisted the sneer at her libido.

"Can I come too?" Sasuke smirked down at the happy boy. "Sure." The responding smile sent a warmth through Sasuke's heart. There were only three people in the world that could do that to him…his smirk diminished and he tossed his head towards the door. "Come on, we've got to hurry so your mom doesn't get mad." When Sasuke stepped out of the house, he breathed a sigh of relief. He hated that house.

"_Oh." He stopped when the girl beside him breathed in awe. His brow furrowed at her ridiculous expression of sparkling eyes and a wide open mouth. "What is it?" She shook her head so that her short hair shifted slightly and some strands slid off her shoulder to join the majority of the mass at her back. "It's beautiful." He was even more confused. What the hell could be so beautiful? But when he turned his head to what she was gazing at, all he saw was a house. "What is?" He felt stupid for asking, but it was the only appropriate thing to say in the current situation. She stopped her drooling to give him a scathing look. "The house." He scoffed at her._

"_I don't see what's so special about it." They both turned their attention back to the blue house, "yale blue" is what she called it. There was a stone wall about as tall as his shoulders that surrounded the front lawn in which was a Koi pond and a large cherry blossom tree on either side of a path that led to a low porch that wrapped around to the back of the house. There was a taller wooden fence blocking the view of the backyard and a large window in what was presumably the living room._

"_It's the perfect family house that's what's special about it." She continued gaping at the two story structure. Sasuke looked back and forth between the house and her. "I'll buy it for you." She shook her head and tore her eyes away with a sigh. "No, I don't need it." He persisted. "If we are going to have a family, then we are going to need the perfect family home." She smiled up at him before continuing to walk. _

"_But we aren't having a family."_

"Daddy, can I get some ice cream?" He was brought out of his memory by the boy. He gazed sternly down at his copy. "No, it will spoil your dinner." The boy pouted. "But I want ice cream." Sasuke narrowed his eyes. "Do you want me to take you back home as well?" A shake of the head was his response. "Hn."

When the duo entered the convenient store, a rush of cool, conditioned air raised goose bumps on their arms do to the contrast from the muggy night. Sasuke followed Raiden down the aisles to the dairy products. "Raiden, slow down before you slip and fall." Sasuke sighed when the boy simply slowed to a jog. The child was so energetic even after various accidents.

_A loud wail assaulted his ears, and Sasuke jumped to his feet, racing outside towards the noise. The wailing got louder, and he flashed beside the heap of the screaming boy. "Raiden, Raiden what happened!" The barely four-year old stared up at him with watering eyes. "It hurts daddy." The words were hardly distinguishable between his hiccupping sobs. Sasuke's eyes were wide with worry, and his hands hovered over the boy, not wanting to touch in case he hurt him more._

"_Raiden, be a strong boy and tell me what hurts." His voice was stern though he was panicking on the inside. What if there was internal bleeding or he had an allergic reaction to something? _

"_M-my arm." The wailing calmed down to whimpers, but the boy's face was still flush and streaked with tears. Sasuke looked over the hunched body to see that the left wrist had developed a second joint in his forearm. It was a severe break. Gingerly, Sasuke brought the arm across his son's chest, ignoring his renewed screams. "I'm taking you to the hospital okay?" The boy nodded in return, and Sasuke flashed through the streets as quickly as he could without jolting his son. _

"_Sakura, I need Sakura." His loud demand had the receptionist immediately paging the doctor. "Daddy, it hurts." He stared down at the small boy. "I know, don't worry we'll fix it." The boy nodded and two minutes later, Sakura came running down the hall. Her eyes widened at the sight of Sasuke, but then immediately narrowed in concentration. "What happened to him?" She turned and beckoned him to follow her to the emergency room. He couldn't help but notice how her new skirt accentuated the movement of her butt with every step she took. "I don't know, he was outside and I think he broke his arm." She nodded and gestured to a bed where he laid him down as she closed the curtain for privacy._

"_Rai-chan what happened?" Her voice softened as she ran her fingers through the boy's sweat-soaked hair soothingly. "My arm hurts." She smiled softly at him, and for a moment Sasuke was jealous. "I know, but how did it start hurting?" The boy whimpered and looked over at his father fearfully. "Don't worry, you won't get into trouble, we just want you to get better so you can be our happy Rai-chan again." At the reassurance, the boy turned his dark eyes back to her. "I fell out of the tree and landed on my arm." Sakura nodded while Sasuke's eyes narrowed. _

_He knew better than to climb the damn tree._

"_Well I sure hope you won't be climbing it again." The boy shook his head in the negative three times for good measure, and the pinkette smiled down at him again. "Can I look at it, so I can fix it?" The little boy hesitated then nodded after a moment. Sakura's face turned back into a mask of concentration as she leaned close to the boy for a good look. Sasuke didn't miss the slight cringe at the sight._

"_Rai-chan this is going to hurt, but we have to make it better as soon as possible so you can grow up and be a big shinobi like your daddy, okay?" He bit his bottom lip in trepidation but still whispered an 'okay'. Pride for his little boy's braveness swelled inside of Sasuke._

_Until Sakura started prodding the break and he started screaming bloody murder. "It is a clean break, and I don't sense any bone fragments, so I suppose I'll just reset the bone and then wrap it up in a cast." Sasuke nodded once. Sakura took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly. "Rai-chan, I'm going to have to reset your arm in order for it to heal. It's going to hurt a lot, but your daddy is going to hold your other hand and I'm giving you permission to squeeze it as hard as you want." The boy whimpered, but Sasuke moved forward to do Sakura's bidding. _

_It was terrible, but at the end of the day, he got to go home in Sakura's arms, smiling with a lollipop, and Sasuke could only shake his head at the boy._

"Here it is daddy, here it is!" Sasuke nodded and the mess of black hair took off down the next aisle again. He followed at a much more gradual pace with his hands in his pockets.

"Sakura-san!"

He stopped in mid-step and held his breath.

"Oh, hello Rai-chan, how are you?" The breath left in a whoosh at the sound of her voice. Sasuke hadn't seen her for the past three weeks.

Three fucking weeks.

"I'm good. We're here to get milk!" Sasuke shuffled closer to the aisle at the sound of her laugh, hidden by the shelves that separated it from the other one, he watched his two precious people interact. "We? Are you here with your mother?" Of course she would ask for his mother first. It wouldn't be suspicious, and she was always worried that someone would find out about the past they shared.

That was why she went to his wedding.

_She was showing just the tiniest bit. Enough to know that she was pregnant, yet the bump could still be covered by properly placed clothing._

_He knew that she purposely chose a form-fitting dress for this reason._

_Step, step, sway, step._

_With bored eyes, he scanned around the dimly lit room. She called it "romantic"._

_It reminded him of Orochimaru's torture chambers. _

_Step, step, sway, step. He turned his gaze towards the corner of the room, and there she was. His chest rose with excitement, but it immediately fell when he took in the person beside her. Damn bastard._

_Step, step, sway, step. She tilted her head to the side as she laughed, the angle must have allowed her to catch a glimpse of him because she turned her eyes that sparkled with the light just a little more his way, and her smile didn't falter._

_Before he could smirk back, he was swept away with a spin. Weren't men supposed to lead? _

_He looked down with emotionless eyes to the girl in white, accented by her innocent smile. It was then that Sasuke discovered that the" nice girl" wasn't so nice after all. _

With a fortifying breath, he stepped out from hiding behind the hanging bag clips and into the brightly lit aisle. "No, I'm with daddy." He watched as she raised her eyes from smiling down at his son to see him. "Hello Sasuke."

He didn't miss the way her eyes lit up just the tiniest bit upon seeing him.

He nodded in response. "What are you doing here Sakura-san?" Both of them looked down at the hopping boy with fondness. "Actually, I was here to get milk, too." She raised the carton in her right hand.

"Ew, why would you get _that _kind?" Her smile brightened at the child's reaction. "Raiden don't be rude." The boy turned back to Sasuke with a look of disgust. "But daddy, it's gross."

"It's healthy, Rai-chan, and it isn't icky." Bull. Shit. He could still remember the time she insisted that Naruto try it with his cereal because it would balance his diet a little.

"_It isn't going to kill you!" She growled at him with her arms crossed. _

"_But Sakura-chan, it doesn't look right!" She huffed as the boy pushed the carton away from him. "You know what, fine. I'll show you." Swiftly, she snatched the carton from the table, threw a pompous look at the blond and tilted her head back to take a large swig. _

_It came spewing out in the next instant._

"…_I told you it sucks."_

She was drinking it for the baby.

"Well Rai-chan, I've got to get home." His face became crestfallen and his father literally reached his hand out as if to stop her.

He covered the motion by resting it on Raiden's shoulder. "We are going to get ice cream, join us." Her green eyes widened in surprise at his request.

"We are?" Sasuke subtly squeezed his son's shoulder to quiet him. "Well, I have to get home before my milk spoils."

"Leave it; we can swing by later to get it." He was aware of how forceful, how desperate, he sounded, but

He

Didn't

Give

A

Fuck.

He missed her, and the baby. Without any options, Sasuke watched triumphantly as she gave in. "Well, I guess that will be alright." Raiden cheered, and Sasuke smirked. She always gave in.

Almost.

"_Sasuke?" Her groggy voice met his ears, and he took that as his cue to enter farther into the room. "What are you doing here?" He didn't answer, only drew closer. He watched her chest rise and fall under the sheet, her bare shoulders indicating it as her only covering. "Sasuke, it's late." He knew it was late, that's why he was there. He made it to the bed and reached a hand out, letting his fingers lightly trace her shoulder and down her arm to circle round her wrist. _

_With satisfaction, he heard her breath increase. "What are you doing?" Again, he didn't bother to answer with words; he simply jerked her wrist, earning an arousing gasp as he pulled her upper half towards him as well with the rough movement. The sheet slid down, and her front was bare for his viewing. _

_Her white breasts seemed to glow in the little light that filtered through the window as they moved up and down with each of her hurried breathes. "Sasuke, stop." She was ignored as his left hand circled around her back and lightly glided down her spine to grasp her rump. His actions made her shudder._

"_I missed you," With those words, he yanked her against him, so she could feel every contour of his body, his hot breath on her face, his erection pressed against her. "Very much." He rubbed his cheek against her own, wondering in the softness of her skin. He inhaled her calming scent as his nose trailed along her neck to her collarbone, where he pressed a sweet kiss before nipping at it. _

"_Oh." Her breathless sigh had testosterone rushing through him, turning him into a more primitive man. "I need you." She shifted her face to look at him. Her lips were parted, and her hair was wavy from the pony-tail she had in when he saw her earlier. "Sasuke…" He pressed their foreheads together and started moving against her. Wanting to fill her with the need that had plagued him for the passed year he had to go without her. "I want you." She bit her bottom lip as her free hand came up to grip his bicep._

"_Sasuke, you need to go home," He immediately froze. Those were not the words that were supposed to come out of her mouth, "to your wife, and newborn." _

Raiden walked, skipped, jumped, and performed all the other antics of a five year old as Sasuke and Sakura strolled along behind him down the closing streets and lampposts of Kohona, watching. Laughing in Sakura's case. It was the exact scene he had pictured whenever the far-fetched idea of having his own family filtered through his mind while off in Sound, running through the world after his brother, or while with the Akatski, morbidly enough. "So, how are you, Sasuke?" Polite formalities, they made him want to barf. Instead, he grunted in a positive tone as a response. Sakura nodded her head as she smiled at Raiden's high kick. "That's good. How is Shoji?" Sasuke smirked at the mention of his second son. Sakura loved Shoji just as much as she loved Raiden.

_The day Shoji was born; she was on a mission to Sand. Two weeks later, Sasuke opened his door to a panting Sakura. "Why the hell didn't you tell me?" Before he could do anything, he was forcefully pushed to the side, and from there he watched with ebony eyes as she flung her shoes off and hail-tailed it to the living room, where the new baby was located, along with its mother._

_Sasuke followed after her and stopped in the entry to the room when he saw her hanging over Harumi with bright, bright eyes, and an 'awed' expression complete with parted lips. "Do you want to hold him?" When he voiced the question, she only nodded slowly, not taking her eyes off the babe swaddled in thick blankets, and his wife shot him a glare, but simply passed her child to the other woman before standing. "I have to go make lunch." Sasuke didn't bother to watch her leave, he stepped fully into the room as Sakura absently sat on the edge of the couch, eyes still glued to the sleeping child._

"_He's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen." Sasuke smirked at her breathless exclamation. When he drew closer, he sat nonchalantly on the opposite side of the couch, watching her watch his baby. While her response to holding to Raiden the first time made Sasuke's heart pound and yank at the irony of it all, this image nearly shattered it. _

_The reason might have been because while Raiden had his father's coloring, he also had mostly his mother's features._

_This baby was entirely Sasuke._

"And Harumi?" The image of the curly blonde woman with large chocolate eyes emerged in his mind, causing his jaw to tighten as he thought about the events earlier that day. He nodded to her question. Silence ensued between them as they sauntered, but it was enjoyable. They hadn't been in the other's presence for a long time, and even with it spent in silence, it was enough.

When they arrived at the ice cream stand, Raiden ordered chocolate, with sprinkles, Sakura ordered chocolate mint, and Sasuke ordered nothing. The establishment was situation on a corner lot, and there were four picnic tables for the customers to sit at and enjoy their treat behind the building. The group that could easily be mistaken as a family, in Sasuke's opinion, seated themselves on the wooden benches attached to the wooden tables.

Almost immediately, Sakura took rapid _bites_ out of her cone, and rolled her tongue around and around the double scooped ice cream continuously.

Sasuke raised a brow at the uncharacteristic mannerisms and turned his eyes to his son who had momentarily forgotten his dripping treat to stare with the identical expression of his father. "Wow Sakura-san, you were hungry." This earned an embarrassed chuckle and prominent blush from the pink-haired woman. "Sorry Rai-chan, I guess the baby was really hungry."

"Raiden, why don't you go get napkins to clean up with." Sasuke watched as the boy nodded and hopped off of the bench to go do his bidding.

As soon as the boy's back was turned, Sasuke swung one of his legs over the bench so that he was straddling it, and he scooted down until he was pressed against Sakura's side. She leaned away and pressed her hands to his chest to try and stop him. "S-Sasuke what are you doing?" He grunted at her quiet shriek, it was pretty obvious what he was doing. He captured her fighting hands against his chest with a firm hand, and rested his chin on her shoulder so that his head was next to her own. "Don't." His command didn't stop her.

"Sasuke, stop people will see." Her frantic whisper had his eyebrows tilting down with displeasure. "Then let them see. I'm only holding my teammate." He inhaled deeply and rubbed his cheek against her own slightly as he pulled her closer to him. "Sasuke, no." He closed his eyes against her denials of giving him this.

"You would let Naruto do this," She stilled at the blonde's name. The one they both loved. "So please, Sakura. Give me this, at least give me this." She gave up her struggles, and he pressed her even closer to his body, so much so that he was sure she could feel his heart beating against her side. Sasuke extended his large hand so that it rested on her swollen belly, much larger than three weeks ago, and ran his fingers across it, towards him, and then back again.

He was rewarded with a desired kick.

Sakura sighed, placed her smaller hand underneath her large abdomen, and let herself lean into him. Sasuke's dark eyes watched his hand skim over her belly over and over, the baby reacting obediently to him as it reached out to connect with his movements, and he let himself pretend.

Pretend that they were together with their child and the caring stares they got were deserved.

He pretended that he didn't have to pretend.

"Daddy, what are you doing?"

Sasuke paused in his ministrations and looked up at his eldest son who stood before them with a handful of napkins and a freshly wiped face. "He's feeling the baby Rai-chan; do you want to feel it too?" The boy slid a look over to his father before he looked back at the pregnant Sakura and smiled brightly. "Yeah!" He slapped the napkins on the table behind them and turned to Sakura while kneeling on the bench. "Okay, what do I do?" Sasuke shifted his hand to the side so that Sakura could grab Raiden's small one and place it on her stomach, just so. "Now wait, if you move around a little bit, it'll kick." Staying very quiet, the little boy rubbed his hand in small, concentrated circles as the two adults watched his face.

Suddenly it lit up. "I felt it! I felt it!" Sakura chuckled at his antics and Sasuke smirked. Raiden was too young when Shoji was born to actually remember feeling his mother's womb. Not that she let him anyways.

_The woman held her stomach protectively. "He's too rambunctious, Sasuke, what if he hits me or something?" The soon-to-be father stared at his wife coldly before carrying his four-year-old out to the yard. _

"Now I know how to rub mommy's tummy." The comment made Sasuke lift his eyes sharply up to the boy. "Why would you rub her stomach?" Sakura froze at his unfriendly tone while Raiden looked at him strangely. "Because she says that you and mommy are trying for another baby, and soon I'll have another little brother or sister?" This time his eyes narrowed as anger ate at him. The woman was frustrating beyond belief. The decision was one that Sasuke wasn't particularly keen on, and the fact that his five-year-old was being told that there was a baby on the way angered him almost as much as the decision itself.

_Sasuke slowly slid into bed despite his throbbing muscles screaming for him to just collapse into a heap. When his head finally made contact with the pillow, he closed his eyes in relief and let his aching body slowly relax. _

_Until a feminine hand reached up to rub his arm. _

_Resisting the urge to smack her hand away, Sasuke calmly grabbed it and pushed it off of him. "Ne, Sasuke-kun what's wrong?" He grunted, hoping she would just shut up, and closed his eyes. "Sasuke, I want to have another baby." Now this got his attention._

"_What?" He felt her press her bare front against his back. "I want to have another baby." He didn't even take the time to consider it._

"_No." She threw her bare leg over his clothed one. "And why not? Don't you want more children?" She had abandoned the sickening sweet voice. "Not now, you just had Shoji, focus on the two we have first." She sighed in frustration, but he could care less._

_Until her hand traveled down his front and didn't stop till passed his waist._

"_You haven't touched me since I was pregnant last, so fuck me." The memory of a girl, years ago, making the same offer appeared in his mind. He mentally swore as she stroked a reaction out of him. Almost two years was a long time for him too. _

"_It doesn't mean we have to have another kid." His tone was biting, against her words and the feeling of her hand on him. _

"_Sakura's pregnant." Sasuke groaned. Of course he knew that she was pregnant. He knew even before she did. All the signs were there, and after witnessing two pregnancies, he recognized them almost immediately. _

"_So?" His traitorous body began moving to her ministrations. "Don't you want her babies and our babies to grow up together? After all, she is your __**teammate**__." He didn't miss the edge of the last word, but at the moment he really couldn't care. Harumi and Sakura being pregnant at the same time would just be…wrong. He rolled over, onto her, knowing it would be the only way to shut her up._

"_We'll talk about it later."_

"That's exciting, Raiden. Maybe you'll get a little sister this time." Sakura's encouraging words put him in an even fouler mood.

She was acting like she didn't care again, and this time, he couldn't tell if it was true or not.

"Come on, we've got to get back." Sasuke ran his hand across the bottom of Sakura's belly one last time and received a goodbye flutter in return before he helped Sakura off the bench.

On the way back to the store, Raiden was calmer despite the intake of sugar, and he was content with walking between Sasuke and Sakura, holding one of their hands in each of his little ones.

He couldn't help but think that this was how it was supposed to be, and maybe in an alternate universe, they would be walking back to the compound after having dinner at Naruto's.

"Shikamaru!" Sasuke was brought out of his musings by Sakura's surprised call. He turned his dark eyes further up the road to see the lazy Jonin staring passively back at them.

Anger coursed through Sasuke at the sight of the man, who was lit by a lamppost by the convenient store, which was their destination, and he had to resist the tightening of his hand around Raiden's. The group stopped themselves in front of the newcomer who regarded them with lazy eyes and a yawn.

"What are you doing here?" The Nara turned his attention to the pinkette when she voiced her question. "Well, you've been gone for a while just to get milk, so I figured I would come and find you in case you went into labor or something."

"Thanks so much for your concern." Sasuke's pale lips twitched upwards at her dry tone, but soon they fell when she released Raiden's hand and crossed the three steps to join the side of the other man.

Sasuke's dark eyes caught the action in slow motion, and it was only when the Nara placed his arm around the waist of the smiling woman that Sasuke realized he was probably going to break his son's hand if he didn't relinquish his hold.

He saw her eyes dance just as bright as the day of his wedding, and although the action gave Sasuke the violent urges towards the man across from him, he also respected him.

Because Nara Shikamaru made her happy when he, Uchiha Sasuke, had failed.

"You baka, I'm only eight months, it's not like I'm going to pop any moment." Raiden laughed at the image of Sakura 'popping' as she so eliquently put it.

"Shikamaru-san, we went and got ice cream, and Sakura-san let me feel your baby!" The boy's exclamation caused Sasuke to bite the inside of his cheek.

Your baby.

_It was almost freezing, even with the raging fire in the cave. Sasuke couldn't repress every shiver and he could clearly hear Sakura's teeth chattering from across the fire. He wanted so badly to go over there and wrap himself around her, like he had many, many times before, to keep her warm. He didn't though and after a half hour, he heard her whisper carry towards him._

"_Shikamaru?" She must have thought that the rest of her team was asleep, and Sasuke wasn't about to tell her differently._

"_Shikamaru?...I know you're not sleeping." The confidence in her voice made Sasuke smirk slightly. "Yes I am." The muffled grunt was followed by a dull smack. "Kami, woman I'm up, what do you want?"_

_This time, the familiar voice was meek. "To talk." Sasuke could picture the dry look that was her statement's reply. "Tch, you women and talking." She obviously took this as a sign to continue._

"_You look like your dad a lot." _

"_And you are troublesome, shut up." He heard a shuffle of a sleeping bag. "Don't be mean, you baka. I've been wondering, do you look like your mom at all?" Her voice was quieter, which meant that the shuffle was her getting closer to __**him**__. _

_Sasuke thought that if he were to get up to piss, that would effectively cut the conversation short, but something inside of him told him to lie still._

_The same voice that had whispered for him to no leave Kohona when he was still a young boy._

"_I don't know." _

"_How do you not know?" He heard a groan of frustration. "I don't know, I just never took the time to notice." _

"_And you call yourself a genius."_

"_Goodnight Sakura." The dismissal was ignored. "Wait, answer my question." Her insistence was starting to grate at Sasuke, why did she need to know so badly? It was only the lazy Nara. _

"_Find it out for yourself." _

"_But how? I've never seen your mom." There was a long pause, and Sasuke waited to hear the sarcastic comeback that lay in store for his teammate and previous lover. _

"_Well, maybe you'll just have to meet her." Another pause, and then softly,_

"_Really?"_

"_Yeah."_

_Four months later, Sasuke was holding back Sakura's hair as she cried and vomited into the toilet bowl, the positive pregnancy stick lay on the counter to their left, and she kept repeating over and over._

"_I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry." He silently whispered that it was okay, but solely because he knew the reason she was crying was for him. _

Sasuke was pulled out of the memory by his son calling to him from his position on Sasuke's back as they traversed the empty road home. Sasuke grunted for him to continue.

"Daddy, do you love Sakura-san." Slight pause. "Why would you say that?" A little head rested itself on Sasuke's shoulder. "Because you look at her like Shikamaru-san looks at her, and you rub her belly but you hardly ever rubbed mommy's belly when Shoji was in her." And here Sasuke had thought that Raiden was too young to remember.

"I care for her, she is my teammate and friend." The little boy replied with an 'oh'. Silence, and then:

"I wish Sakura-san was my mommy." Sasuke stopped walking, silently agreeing with the boy, but instead, "Don't say that, you have a good mother, who loves you very much." When he wasn't around that is.

"But Sakura-san is nicer, she smiles at me and tells me I'm a good boy, and listens to me, and I like her smell better than mommy's."

Sasuke wondered if attraction could be genetic.

It wasn't as if Sakura gave the boy sugar and was nice all the time, his son knew better than to get on her bad side, yet he still preferred her to his own mother.

"Don't tell your mother that." The little boy giggled. "I'm not stupid, daddy." Again, Sasuke continued and silence wrapped around the father and son. He thought that Raiden had fallen asleep until their brown house came into view and he spoke again.

"I hope Sakura-san has a little girl." Sasuke grunted, "Why?" The boy rubbed his forehead on his father's shoulder before answering quietly,

"Because then I can protect her, and when she grows up she can marry Shoji." Sasuke smirked at his son's logic.

That might not be such a bad idea.

_It was dark as he sat and listened to her cry._

_He didn't know if it was for him, or Naruto, Kakashi, or for the way life got so fucked up._

_So he sat and listened. _

_Sakura was never a beautiful crier. When she cried, her eyes turned blood-shot and puffy, and snot rolled down from her nose and across her lips like a freaking waterfall. Her gasps and sobs would make it nearly impossible for her to breathe until she was left in silent shaking with her mouth open in silent screams of pain._

_That's what she was like when she really, really cried. _

_He often wondered if she ever cried like that when he was gone. When he killed Orochimaru and didn't come back, when he joined the group that wanted to kill her best friend, when he targeted her home, when he squeezed the life out of her throat._

_So now, he wondered if he was the reason she cried now, looking like the hag his replacement often called her._

_Before he was ripped to shreds on a mission to the land of waves._

_He tilted his pale face up towards the twinkling stars. Who was looking down? Naruto berating him for leaving her like this? Again._

_Kakashi, sighing at how he managed to isolate himself from the last person who understood him. _

_His brother for destroying everything that he dedicated his life to._

_His parents…_

_Sasuke decided that there were too many stars staring down at him, and he moved to gaze into the dark window again. She was still going at it, as loud as ever. He closed his eyes, imagining the vibrant green her eyes would be like between the appalling redness that would surround them._

_It was the only beautiful thing about her when she cried. His fingers, which were wrapped around his upraised knee, twitched with the urge to slip through her open window and just wrap his arms around her. Pulling her as close as possible and inhaling her scent, calming her silent sobs before she suffocated on them._

_But he didn't, because she didn't want him like that ever again._

_And he wondered if this was the reason she cried tonight._

_And last night, and the night before that, and two weeks ago…_

_He was tempted to turn on the sharingan for the simple reason to see her clearly because the dark took her too far away, but that's the way she wanted it to be, and so he gave her the only comfort he could: listening to her cries, sharing her sorrow. _

_Until he came along. With angered pants, Sasuke listened as her door opened, and she sniffed in an attempt to quiet her sobs._

"_Stop crying, it's too troublesome."_

_He listened as the intruder slid into bed with her and pulled her close, her cries dying down slowly until not even a hiccup could be heard, and then Sasuke stood up to leave. There were two things that would happen, and he didn't want to stay for either one._

_Either he would listen to their breathing as they slept, holding each other close, or his ears would be assaulted with Sakura's sweet moans that were caused by someone either than him._

_But tonight was different._

"_He was there when I found out, he saw the test." Sasuke paused in his escape. "Yeah?" So he knew she was pregnant too?_

"_His face, it just, it…it was like when he first came back." _

"…_he loves you, you know." Sasuke leaned back against the tree, wondering when she got so good at reading him. "Yeah, I know, and I love him too, but…"_

"_But?" Her sobs started up again, yet they hadn't reached their suffocating potential just yet, so he was able to capture a few words. _

"_At first, it felt wrong being with him because Naruto and Kakashi weren't there, and I was always, always reminded of them," Ah, so __**that**__ was the reason. So he always made her sad, no matter what he did._

"_But now, it's different." He heard the trepidation in the man's voice as he questioned what was different now. "Because I love you, not more, but in the way that I want to be with you." He heard a sniff as he turned his head away from the confession that had come from the open window. "And what's worse is that I think he knows it." Sasuke shut his eyes against her words, biting his lip to keep it from moving._

"…_It isn't going to change anything though, he's going to still be there for you, and now he'll be there for our baby too. Loving it because it will be apart of you." Sasuke sucked in a quick breath through his nose, but he couldn't disagree with his words. When he had first realized she was with child, another man's child, he had already loved it because it was hers. _

"_Thank you." Sasuke's lips twitched in remembrance of those two words as he hopped off the tree and headed home to his two sleeping boys._

_The pink-haired girl was always going to be there, and he was sure she knew that a black-haired boy would always be behind her, no matter if she fell or not._

**I know, I know, the ending sucked, but I couldn't think of like a 'wow' ending or even one that wasn't just blah. So I hope that satisfied your angsty pleasures, and if it didn't, I tried. Oh, and **

**Raiden means god of thunder, which I thought was cool since Sasuke wields lightning :) hehe and **

**Shoji means 'faithful second son'. So thanks for reading :)**


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